Newish Player-Worried about my group.

[HyperDunkBarkly]

Hello, GITP. I'm concerned about my group. it's my first campaign and I don't know if there is anything I can do. we just...have problems. it's not the worst, but it's conflict. I guess I should describe it.


we are a group of 5ish players(where only 4 usually show up) that has gone through at least a little in the last 2 months. two of us(Myself and a friend I brought with me) are the newbies/newcomers to the social circle. none of us are playing long, in-depth backstories as we like to have our characters expand real-time/lack the experience/I specifically dislike retroactive storytelling. we wanted

our group consists of:

1 Munchkin: Our group munchkin is essentially a tier whore. no matter what the rest of us are rolling, he simply picks something from the first two or three tiers and immediately attempts to break it with little more than basic RP thrown into the mix, rarely amounting to more than a premise/excuse to make it pass. rolled an orc barbarian that innocently beat our PC's half to death people then RP'd him abandoning everyone so he could bring in his insane bard/future dread necromancer/future lich and attempted to use an artifact to replicate a necronomicon in front of two worshippers of pelor. admitted in character to being a necromancer and turned himself into an undead. we dumped pelor juice right down his throat after our characters figured it out. then he rolled some foxperson homebrew dragoon and died of fall damage. soon after, he and one of the other members rolled tiefling psionics or something. they TPK'd(killed a shopkeeper right in sight of multiple LG-alligned players, including a cleric. we thought the healer would lose everything and RP'd moral compulsion to take up arms) us with his psionic powers and construct golem things. I don't know. followed up by rolling a neraphim iajutsu factotum/future assassin. currently playing binder and tried to abuse the free full plates for infinite cash, got sad when DM veto'd it. always rules lawyers, always talks over other people, when idle never stops asking about what we think of his character and has few noteworthy "team" interactions as he rarely brings up intercharacter interactions.

2 Newbies. my friend is better at researching than I am and can actually put together a proper class puzzle. I can study builds I see in-game and to an extent build something by examining feats basing off that. but my big thing is that I attempt to make support characters. my friend has rolled sorcerer twice because he wanted to respect the DM's wishes to keep a low-mid power level, and actively held back on the power(feels constrained but is content to not crush things. wants to batman anyway) each time.

I rolled classic fighter ASAP and was put in my place. I then tried beguiler and enjoyed playing crossdressing skillmonkey while munchkin couldn't since he was away at work a lot. it went well. DM wanted someone to play a homebrew class(dragoon v2) so I switched to that while munchkin rolled binder. we had my sorcerer friend detonate us with about 25 pounds of sharpnel fire bombs my beguiler made via some really good rolls to sneak in and steal them. I did some dumb things and flirted too much anyway. I am probably biased, but I try to interact with my friend and our healer's characters often, usually humorously or cooperatively with various skills. I like to think I'm making the game fun, and it's totally possible I'm a hindrance.


1 semi-experienced healer. Our cleric has been through a few campaigns, like our munchkin has. they and one other member have been in the social circle a while. he likes playing the healer, rarely anything else. but his characters are usually polite or humorous and we work together to handle things. currently a fairy cleric.

1 more semi-experienced player. this player is the healer's roommate. this group is online via roll20 and skype. started psionic anthrofox and RP'd it as a very sophisticated person. regularly came up with clever tricks and on a few occasions even showed off a few tricks I'd take later. plays somewhere between power gamer and RP'er, maybe swinging toward power gamer. currently an archivist because the DM banned tome of battle, but has been sick a few weeks.

1 jackoff who almost never shows up because family reasons. probably only joined because he heard us mention we were playing and spends half the time stiffling back his rage at the munchkin and making me feel pressured to play mediator between the two. plays an elf ranger legolas(we seriously just started calling him legolots) with a cat who spontaneously drops comatose when the player doesn't come. been tempted several times to loot him.

Our DM. Our DM has a few problems. Mostly some combination of not knowing info off the top of his head or having it stashed/noted somewhere(even info that has come up) and just being inconsistent. He will rule something off the top of his head one week(we meet once a week unless a special session is called), forget to note his home rule after we accept it, and then change it when it comes up the next. and then munchkin will seriously go "Well....actually" and then rules lawyer for several minutes. seriously, that has happened multiple times per session the last 3 weeks.

Before I started this game I watched quite a bit of counter monkey. I learned early on that between the DM and the books, the DM's ruling is what matters. I can accept DM Fiat, especially if he just makes up a good explanation right there. I am willing to accept anything so long as he can simply make not-completely-insane-sense of it. I'll even accept "it's just too cheesy" as a reason. but we want him to be consistent.
and also not to put will saves of +5(fighter class) and +9(a lancer-esque melee class) on mobs currently locking down his level 2 mostly caster party. seriously, what the hell. we JUST rerolled from level 1 after that TPK.

I just hit this realization that something was wrong and I needed consultation when my friend used a term from the counter monkey videos: referred to it as a meat grinder. last dungeon we went through an infinitely-spewing gas trap planted in a treasure chest my broke into a room with, snuck past a bone golem(150 HP) to hit the dual switches that needed to be timed PERFECTLY and were in separate rooms(thank you beguiler "message" spell), the sorcerer literally countermagic'd a weak mimic out of existence AND got sneak attacked by a living armor in a complete load of DM bull**** because "he didn't do a spot when entering" even though we (rider kicked) opened the door and he triggered an event on us(we checked and befriended a merchant that was under the rubble of said door) in the same span of time(sorcerer was just being quiet to not interrupt the RP going on). perhaps it's my inexperience, but everything above what I expected at level 2. the bone golem(between his massive HP and the various stats on what I found online afterwards) probably would have 1 shot us turn by turn individually unless we abused something like simply creating and blessing holy water then chucking it at him from outside his range(which would just be waaaaaaaaaay too cheap and possibly metagaming). I mean, we're squishy mages/skillmonkey. I had maybe 9 HP at the time and illusions don't work on that thing at all. it wasn't until we reached a room WAAAAAAAAY the hell south of it that we found the gunpowder and shrapnel I mentioned earlier. that was intended to blow it up...after he made it clear to me that the trapmaking prestige class I was interested wouldn't pan out in the long run and it'd wind up just disappointing.it wasn't until after the final boss of the dungeon that I'd leveled up enough to jam a point in the skill and attempt to craft them. but by then...why bother? we'd skipped the golem by simply going around once we found the off switch for the deadly gas.

because if that isn't appropriate for our levels, then I'll feel compelled to call BS the next time the DM says he feels constrained and unable to throw things "on level" with us. he straight up said in a skype call that he's been putting us against things that are weak to/for our party because we lacked a dedicated melee class(because he killed our warblade with a succubus for rolling a ToB class instead of just vetoing the class before the session). if that IS appropriate for a level 2 party(we're now level 4 and have a non-tanky melee class in the party. me as dragoon.) then I need to know and need to adjust my expectations.

what can I do about this, as a player? I know I'm venting quite a bit here, I won't deny that. but I honestly am curious if I'm just not noticing something that's my fault or that I can do to help things. can I even help with any of these things?

[Larrx]

Gah.

That group sounds . . . very different than the folks who sit around my table.

1. The munchkin: The main problem here is not that he's a munchkin. In fact munchkin type play may be appropriate at this table (see the DM section). The builds you listed aren't really all that broken/powerful compared to the real problem (tier 1-2) builds. I'm sure others will go into more depth with this, but you might want to review Jaronk's tier list. The real problem seems to be that he engages in PvP or PvP inducing activities, and the rest of the group doesn't want this. I frown on PvP in D&D for several reasons:

-The vast majority of games that you can play with your friends are competitive. The options for that sort of play are manifold. I play D&D for the fun and novel cooperative experience.

-D&D is not a very balanced game, but what little balance there is assumes a diverse and organized team fighting monsters together. PvP situations are often laughably one sided. Typically the aggressor has an enormous advantage. PvP is not fun socially, and it is not interesting mechanically (usually).

-It can disrupt the game. "The BBEG completes his accession while you guys are fighting among yourselves, the world is now a featureless plain/undead wasteland. Do you want to keep playing, or start a new campaign?" "I really didn't expect two of you to get murdered by your own party before you open this door, but whatever, you see three hydras. Do you want to roll new characters now, or do you want to fight it out?" Not fun for the poor DM who's running such a game.

-If everyone is not on board for PvP it can cause a lot of hurt feelings. This seems to be what's happening with your group.

PvP can be done right. It can be fun and interesting, but that requires maturity and system mastery that it seems (from reading the OP) that your party lacks. Maybe show the munchkin my list and see if he'll tone it down? Be nice about it if you do.

2. The Jackoff: I don't really see a problem here. Family does come first. If I were in a game where one player's behavior was disrupting the game, and ruining other peoples fun I would also be upset. Especially if I had limited play time due to familial responsibilities. I wouldn't be angry or mean, but I would be upset and I'd be unlikely to stay silent.

3. The DM: I don't really know what to say here. Judging only on what you wrote in the OP your DM seems less than perfect, and I would not enjoy his style of game. Many people would though, and I've certain seen far more egregious behavior. You guys seem to have gone through a lot of characters for 2 months of play, but for certain styles of game that can be normal. If that is the norm than the sorts of characters that the munchkin writes(no backstory, no RP, just mechanics) are actually more appropriate than the alternative. What's the incentive to RP when you expect your character to live at -most- through the next 4 rooms of the dungeon (~20 min of in game time)? I abhor this kind of game, but some people like it. YMMV. The only real problem I see (other than differences in taste, which isn't really a failure to DM well) is that he seems to be falling into the 'puzzles with only one solution (read my mind)' trap. If the DM is open to constructive criticism, direct him to The Angry DM's article on how to run a mystery. Disclaimer: All of the above comments on the DM are simply my best guesses. I don't believe I have enough information to make a real analysis.

The other players all seem fine. Hope that was helpful.

edit: typo

[atemu1234]

Hello, GITP. I'm concerned about my group. it's my first campaign and I don't know if there is anything I can do. we just...have problems. it's not the worst, but it's conflict. I guess I should describe it.


I'm going to start off here and say that group dynamic problems are generally solved by seeing who wants what, and trying to resolve it from there.


we are a group of 5ish players(where only 4 usually show up) that has gone through at least a little in the last 2 months. two of us(Myself and a friend I brought with me) are the newbies/newcomers to the social circle. none of us are playing long, in-depth backstories as we like to have our characters expand real-time/lack the experience/I specifically dislike retroactive storytelling. we wanted

No one likes retroactive storytelling but it tends to be a necessity in most groups. The thing about a backstory is that it functions a little bit like a roleplaying anchor. That way, you have a basis for your character and how he's supposed to act. Whether or not this works out, however, is up to the player and the group.


our group consists of:

This is the part I find most interesting.


1 Munchkin: Our group munchkin is essentially a tier whore. <-love the wording here no matter what the rest of us are rolling, he simply picks something from the first two or three tiers and immediately attempts to break it with little more than basic RP thrown into the mix, rarely amounting to more than a premise/excuse to make it pass. rolled an orc barbarian that innocently beat our PC's half to death people then RP'd him abandoning everyone so he could bring in his insane bard/future dread necromancer/future lich and attempted to use an artifact to replicate a necronomicon in front of two worshippers of pelor. admitted in character to being a necromancer and turned himself into an undead. we dumped pelor juice right down his throat after our characters figured it out. then he rolled some foxperson homebrew dragoon and died of fall damage. soon after, he and one of the other members rolled tiefling psionics or something. they TPK'd(killed a shopkeeper right in sight of multiple LG-alligned players, including a cleric. we thought the healer would lose everything and RP'd moral compulsion to take up arms) us with his psionic powers and construct golem things. I don't know. followed up by rolling a neraphim iajutsu factotum/future assassin. currently playing binder and tried to abuse the free full plates for infinite cash, got sad when DM veto'd it. always rules lawyers, always talks over other people, when idle never stops asking about what we think of his character and has few noteworthy "team" interactions as he rarely brings up intercharacter interactions.

I am usually of the opinion that you can't "win" a roleplaying game. Now, this player seems to be at odds with the group. What I'd do is suggest that he play a simple, single-class melee character, no ACFs, no fancy featwork, nothing. See if we can break his nasty habit of breaking the game. If he says no, he can leave, at least, that's how it would be handled in my group.

Otherwise, work on his roleplaying. Power level can be annoying, but no roleplaying is even more so.


2 Newbies. my friend is better at researching than I am and can actually put together a proper class puzzle. I can study builds I see in-game and to an extent build something by examining feats basing off that. but my big thing is that I attempt to make support characters. my friend has rolled sorcerer twice because he wanted to respect the DM's wishes to keep a low-mid power level, and actively held back on the power(feels constrained but is content to not crush things. wants to batman anyway) each time.

And yet the DM lets mister munchkin play? That screams DM favoritism to me. Is he related to or close friends to the MK?


I rolled classic fighter ASAP and was put in my place. I then tried beguiler and enjoyed playing crossdressing skillmonkey while munchkin couldn't since he was away at work a lot. it went well. DM wanted someone to play a homebrew class(dragoon v2) so I switched to that while munchkin rolled binder. we had my sorcerer friend detonate us with about 25 pounds of sharpnel fire bombs my beguiler made via some really good rolls to sneak in and steal them. I did some dumb things and flirted too much anyway. I am probably biased, but I try to interact with my friend and our healer's characters often, usually humorously or cooperatively with various skills. I like to think I'm making the game fun, and it's totally possible I'm a hindrance.

I'm unfamiliar with Dragoon. It seems like the game goes better without the munchkin, though.


1 semi-experienced healer. Our cleric has been through a few campaigns, like our munchkin has. they and one other member have been in the social circle a while. he likes playing the healer, rarely anything else. but his characters are usually polite or humorous and we work together to handle things. currently a fairy cleric.

Oh, good, thank the gods, someone has a healer in their party. Most of my groups that role isn't even given; we've had to run from more than a few encounters.


1 more semi-experienced player. this player is the healer's roommate. this group is online via roll20 and skype. started psionic anthrofox and RP'd it as a very sophisticated person. regularly came up with clever tricks and on a few occasions even showed off a few tricks I'd take later. plays somewhere between power gamer and RP'er, maybe swinging toward power gamer. currently an archivist because the DM banned tome of battle, but has been sick a few weeks.

Tsk tsk, I have a pet peeve about DMs banning balanced material. Ask him to at least approve a couple feats from there (one of my favorites is a Fighter 2/Barbarian X with Superior Unarmed strike, not unbalanced but quite epic).


1 jackoff who almost never shows up because family reasons. probably only joined because he heard us mention we were playing and spends half the time stiffling back his rage at the munchkin and making me feel pressured to play mediator between the two. plays an elf ranger legolas(we seriously just started calling him legolots) with a cat who spontaneously drops comatose when the player doesn't come. been tempted several times to loot him.

Don't hold it against a person if they can't show up. Get someone else to play the character (preferably a new player, to show them the ropes), and if that doesn't work, then tell the person he'll either have to show up more, or not play. No friendships have to be broken, but it is kind of a necessity for a player to be there for his characters.


Our DM. Our DM has a few problems. Mostly some combination of not knowing info off the top of his head or having it stashed/noted somewhere(even info that has come up) and just being inconsistent. He will rule something off the top of his head one week(we meet once a week unless a special session is called), forget to note his home rule after we accept it, and then change it when it comes up the next. and then munchkin will seriously go "Well....actually" and then rules lawyer for several minutes. seriously, that has happened multiple times per session the last 3 weeks.

DM needs to tell the munchking (typo, but totally calling him that now) to shut his mouth. Players do not (and I repeat, DO NOT) tell the DM how to play his game. If the munchking has a problem with that, then he needs to find his own game, and DM for some players like him.


Before I started this game I watched quite a bit of counter monkey. I learned early on that between the DM and the books, the DM's ruling is what matters. I can accept DM Fiat, especially if he just makes up a good explanation right there. I am willing to accept anything so long as he can simply make not-completely-insane-sense of it. I'll even accept "it's just too cheesy" as a reason. but we want him to be consistent.
and also not to put will saves of +5(fighter class) and +9(a lancer-esque melee class) on mobs currently locking down his level 2 mostly caster party. seriously, what the hell. we JUST rerolled from level 1 after that TPK.

Explain the concept of the CR system to the DM. This strikes me as a fairly common new DM mistake, so don't judge him too harshly.


I just hit this realization that something was wrong and I needed consultation when my friend used a term from the counter monkey videos: referred to it as a meat grinder. last dungeon we went through an infinitely-spewing gas trap planted in a treasure chest my broke into a room with, snuck past a bone golem(150 HP) to hit the dual switches that needed to be timed PERFECTLY and were in separate rooms(thank you beguiler "message" spell), the sorcerer literally countermagic'd a weak mimic out of existence AND got sneak attacked by a living armor in a complete load of DM bull**** because "he didn't do a spot when entering" even though we (rider kicked) opened the door and he triggered an event on us(we checked and befriended a merchant that was under the rubble of said door) in the same span of time(sorcerer was just being quiet to not interrupt the RP going on). perhaps it's my inexperience, but everything above what I expected at level 2. the bone golem(between his massive HP and the various stats on what I found online afterwards) probably would have 1 shot us turn by turn individually unless we abused something like simply creating and blessing holy water then chucking it at him from outside his range(which would just be waaaaaaaaaay too cheap and possibly metagaming). I mean, we're squishy mages/skillmonkey. I had maybe 9 HP at the time and illusions don't work on that thing at all. it wasn't until we reached a room WAAAAAAAAY the hell south of it that we found the gunpowder and shrapnel I mentioned earlier. that was intended to blow it up...after he made it clear to me that the trapmaking prestige class I was interested wouldn't pan out in the long run and it'd wind up just disappointing.it wasn't until after the final boss of the dungeon that I'd leveled up enough to jam a point in the skill and attempt to craft them. but by then...why bother? we'd skipped the golem by simply going around once we found the off switch for the deadly gas.

Explain to the DM the concept of the CR system. Possibly punctuated by blows to his head. With the Dungeon Master's Guide.

Followed by the Monster Manual.

Ah, hell, the Player's Handbook too.


because if that isn't appropriate for our levels, then I'll feel compelled to call BS the next time the DM says he feels constrained and unable to throw things "on level" with us. he straight up said in a skype call that he's been putting us against things that are weak to/for our party because we lacked a dedicated melee class(because he killed our warblade with a succubus for rolling a ToB class instead of just vetoing the class before the session). if that IS appropriate for a level 2 party(we're now level 4 and have a non-tanky melee class in the party. me as dragoon.) then I need to know and need to adjust my expectations.

Yeah, this seems like mostly BS. This guy needs to let the party have some free-reign, and you should probably find a different group. Heck, maybe you should try DMing. I think you'd make a decent one. You've had to deal with pretty much the worst player BS ever, so far, so I think you'd be prepared.


what can I do about this, as a player? I know I'm venting quite a bit here, I won't deny that. but I honestly am curious if I'm just not noticing something that's my fault or that I can do to help things. can I even help with any of these things?

Again, start a new group, leave this one, or learn to deal with it. It doesn't sound like it's going to change, so good luck, whatever you do.

[Bluydee]

Mostly what they said. Each person has their own reasons and style of play, and that's fine. The munchkin is not really a munchkin though, just seems to prefer combat to RPing. The jack-off, however, does not deserve to be insulted. Family is far more important than a game. I would be mad if the little time I played was interrupted by all the time. Calling him a jack-off is unwarranted.

Your DM sounds terrible though.

[HyperDunkBarkly]

No one likes retroactive storytelling but it tends to be a necessity in most groups. The thing about a backstory is that it functions a little bit like a roleplaying anchor. That way, you have a basis for your character and how he's supposed to act. Whether or not this works out, however, is up to the player and the group.

that's actually a pretty interesting point. I've been picking a personality basis(3-5 traits) and building upon that so far.



And yet the DM lets mister munchkin play? That screams DM favoritism to me. Is he related to or close friends to the MK?
his attitude for a while was that if he didn't like what you'd play, he'd let it through. then do everything he could to kill you. I eventually talked him into simply vetoing things like a straightforward person.

I'm unfamiliar with Dragoon. It seems like the game goes better without the munchkin, though.
it's FF11/14 inspired. couple of jump moves, emphasis on expanding crit threat range and spear feats. crafting feats for making equipment from large game like the monster hunter series. single target crit-oriented striker class.

I have the details thrown into a wordpad but I don't feel right about distributing it.

Oh, good, thank the gods, someone has a healer in their party. Most of my groups that role isn't even given; we've had to run from more than a few encounters.]
healer and roommate are the only people I'd known for a while before joining the circle. most of us played the same MMO(Dungeon Fighter Online) a while back and I met roommate via guild. he introduced me to notmunchkin(just having trouble thinking of something more appropriate atm) and later, healer, who had been on fanforums for the game YEARS and I never made friends with them.

and now fairly good friends we are, I'd like to think.


Tsk tsk, I have a pet peeve about DMs banning balanced material. Ask him to at least approve a couple feats from there (one of my favorites is a Fighter 2/Barbarian X with Superior Unarmed strike, not unbalanced but quite epic).
he seems convinced the classes(but has never mentioned the feats now that I think of it) are imbalanced and that if he didn't murder the warblade by level 4 the thing would literally be unkillable and crush the campaign.

he likes barbarians so a pounce barb would probably go unpunished.


Don't hold it against a person if they can't show up. Get someone else to play the character (preferably a new player, to show them the ropes), and if that doesn't work, then tell the person he'll either have to show up more, or not play. No friendships have to be broken, but it is kind of a necessity for a player to be there for his characters.
yeah, I shouldn't hold it against him. sometimes he tells us he doesn't show up because family, and others because of the notmunchkin. He was gone without notice for 2-3 weeks for a while there, came back for one, spent half of it quiet because he has no threshold before becoming angry(opting to quietly stew and vent to me so I can go explain to munchy that he's obliviously ticking the guy off) then disappearing for a while.

when he comes back we just slap him on the back and tell him what happened to lego-lots while he was gone. his cat has been feeding him each day while he passes out.


DM needs to tell the munchking (typo, but totally calling him that now) to shut his mouth.
...I'm taking that.

Players do not (and I repeat, DO NOT) tell the DM how to play his game. If the munchking has a problem with that, then he needs to find his own game, and DM for some players like him.
I need to ask for my own sake(and sorcerer) but how far does this go? does this include DM Consistency? or trying once or twice per issue(but not fighting/yelling over him) to mention how something done by the DM conflicts with the impression a book gave?

like earlier, I don't mind him changing things so long as it makes sense and stays that way forever. sorcerer got a lvl 10 fireball staff 2 weeks ago. DM flipflopped twice last night over whether it could be recharged and whether or not it'd retain a base caster level or the level of the slot he charged into it. sorcerer rolled with his final decision in the end(slot-level based) but just wants him to get consistent. I was allowed to take 20 to craft bombs one session but the next the group was told "no taking 20 on craft skills" last night.

Explain the concept of the CR system to the DM. This strikes me as a fairly common new DM mistake, so don't judge him too harshly.
Explain to the DM the concept of the CR system. Possibly punctuated by blows to his head. With the Dungeon Master's Guide.
Followed by the Monster Manual.
Ah, hell, the Player's Handbook too.

he knows what it is and I don't feel qualified to explain such things to him. he deliberately picked a succubus to kill off the warblade while he was passed out drunk then when he quit(later came back since healer convinced him) since that's supposedly a CR6 creature that blatantly existed to off a character we actually liked interacting with. he justified it by saying that 3 people resisted my beguiler's ghost sound spell to tell the bar to "SHUT UP" when they started a barfight(s/he was stressed out and really wanted a drink). one was the quest giver he signaled for me later, another was barkeep if I'm remembering right, and the third was either the succubus herself or something that summoned it. so...foreshadowing I guess?

he seems to feel it was justified.

I'm on skype multiple times a day with munchking and DM and I try to inspire what I can gather to be "better gelling agents" for the group behavior, but it takes forever and usually things explode before then. the two of us newbies have multiple plans to react to things ranging from demonstrative to spiteful to almost weird to make a point and we'd really rather not. nothing truly bitter like party wipes, but also still mostly very fun character concepts that could also serve as a point and example of complaints like rolling commoners and RP as farmhands or school thugs and not taking quest hooks or habenero druids. plus it'd be funny as hell to play as.

we've mentioned at least half our character concepts before and the DM reacted to them pleasantly for the most part, especially the thugs. we feel like we could attempt to make a point without yelling or gnashing teeth if we picked out words right.


Yeah, this seems like mostly BS. This guy needs to let the party have some free-reign, and you should probably find a different group.
I want to say we get some degree of free reign, but we haven't tested the "take no quest hooks" method yet.


Heck, maybe you should try DMing. I think you'd make a decent one. You've had to deal with pretty much the worst player BS ever, so far, so I think you'd be prepared.
heh, I would consider it if I had a better knowledge pool or could write to save my life. but healer's roommate bought mentor the week before he got the flu(and FF14 patch 2.4 launched) and is setting up a campaign. so far almost everyone has rolled up characters at least. I'm going to be a beautiful battle cleric, even rolled really good stats!


Again, start a new group, leave this one, or learn to deal with it. It doesn't sound like it's going to change, so good luck, whatever you do.
that's what I was worried about, and discussing it last night with sorcerer buddy is why I felt the need to make this thread and seek guidance. we're going to try for a while then make a decision together. I went into this with him and I'll stick with it as long as he's willing to. we both made at least one good friend out of it so we're pretty content.


Gah.

That group sounds . . . very different than the folks who sit around my table.

well, I'm certainly interested in learning from experience, anyone's really.


1. The munchkin: The main problem here is not that he's a munchkin. In fact munchkin type play may be appropriate at this table (see the DM section). The builds you listed aren't really all that broken/powerful compared to the real problem (tier 1-2) builds. I'm sure others will go into more depth with this, but you might want to review Jaronk's tier list.
then I suppose I need to reconsider what sort of impression I have of him. I dunno what this "anima mage" he's going for is anyway.

also, said tier list has been posted to the group MANY times. we've all had a chance to read it and I'm quite fond of his answer to what the best tier is.

-If everyone is not on board for PvP it can cause a lot of hurt feelings. This seems to be what's happening with your group.
the majority of us aren't too bugged about the characters who die. we see it as something we didn't want in this campaign, but we willingly rolled up better characters than our ones that died with no complaint over losing our characters(and I would have heard them throughout the week in private calls while we were planning).

what I made VERY bluntly clear to him was that if he asked the words "Soooooooooooo...what did you think of that TPK?" I was out. because he would ask several times a week/day depending on how often we interacted "soooooo....what did you think of my character?" to the point where I was getting smothered and very annoyed.

I lost...well, one level 2 fighter I did a bad job at building and playing. the time spent interacting with people was fun and I'll miss that, but the players are there and we're slowly but surely building a second attempt at them in the near future now.


2. The Jackoff: I don't really see a problem here. Family does come first. If I were in a game where one player's behavior was disrupting the game, and ruining other peoples fun I would also be upset. Especially if I had limited play time due to familial responsibilities. I wouldn't be angry or mean, but I would be upset and I'd be unlikely to stay silent.
my problem with Family Man(you guys are right that he shouldn't be faulted for tending to his offline duties) is that he almost never attends(maybe 3/8 sessions so far) and when he does, he spends it quiet and almost immediately pissed off at munchking. He rages way too easily and never shows up or mentions to anyone(except maybe the DM since I'm not keeping tabs on them) that he won't. he literally disappeared off my math for nearly a month.

I guess he'll pull through sooner or later.


3. The DM: I don't really know what to say here. Judging only on what you wrote in the OP your DM seems less than perfect, and I would not enjoy his style of game. Many people would though, and I've certain seen far more egregious behavior. You guys seem to have gone through a lot of characters for 2 months of play, but for certain styles of game that can be normal. If that is the norm than the sorts of characters that the munchkin writes(no backstory, no RP, just mechanics) are actually more appropriate than the alternative. What's the incentive to RP when you expect your character to live at -most- through the next 4 rooms of the dungeon (~20 min of in game time)? I abhor this kind of game, but some people like it. YMMV. The only real problem I see (other than differences in taste, which isn't really a failure to DM well) is that he seems to be falling into the 'puzzles with only one solution (read my mind)' trap. If the DM is open to constructive criticism, direct him to The Angry DM's article on how to run a mystery.
we're told to expect RP to lead to either interesting PC-to-PC or PC-to-NPC interations and to an extent we've gotten that. my old fighter actually converted from atroa or out of gratitude to pelor for regenerating his arm(which was broken horribly when I tried to beat the sorcerer under paranoid covetous rage by a knockoff "The One Ring" and holding a Midus Hammer. it had actually afflicted the sorcerer with a similar rage too and the orc broke my arm to get it out) and because his friend was also a worshiper. as PVP as that could have been/maybe was...it was fun. I wish such things weren't thrown at me first level, but it was fun and I tried to make a good speech during my prayer.

we try to get more out of it than simply better shop prices. I don't think it's a scenario where we're primed to expect a primarily combat campaign.

Disclaimer: All of the above comments on the DM are simply my best guesses. I don't believe I have enough information to make a real analysis.
The other players all seem fine. Hope that was helpful.
thank you either way, and all the others.

[HyperDunkBarkly]

group is getting better(and we meet more frequently) as we level up and can more stably handle the DM's shannygans. we took out a homebrew garuda hard mode from FF14 tonight on our way to a red dragon that I assume is juvenile, young adult, or adult age. garuda had MASSIVE(guessing around 2000) HP and was pumping out constant damage in the range of 15(50% mitigation from homebrew environmental mechanics specific to boss) to 30 without mitigation on my HP of 30(I have been rolling mediocre on a d10+2 for HP the whole game). we took her down after the mage got 3 hits with ray of enfeeblement to drop her and then coup de grace'd her.

I basically got 2 size increases and did special jump attacks for 4d6+42 + 2 added effects of 1d6+42 for the majority of fight while this happened, using verbal free actions to talk to the boss and keeping her attention by provoking in her language. her saves were INSANE. 16/24/20. just...wow. but we took her down, and it was satisfying. this is how we hit level 6.

the mood of the party has been going well too.
binder isn't going anima mage anymore, he seems to want to try making it into a tank(might be cool).
our fairy cleric is buffing, healing, cracking jokes everywhere. we recruited a minotaur NPC and she wants to marry him.
I'm crafting armor for all of us later, replicating a kamen rider look for laughs. I advanced my guild rank and after seeing the room I get...decided my character wants to own property, like a stronghold.
our sorcerer spent all of last week RPing in town making sales pitches to get us some cool things, like making a bakery. sold this weird ever-heating stone that is "akin to a piece of the sun, will never stop producing furnace-worthy heat temperatures) to the king for 4 payments of 6,000 gp(gold in this campaign uses smaller numbers than a normal one).
our archivist has formally quit after recovering from his flu. doesn't agree with the DM's methods, doesn't want to deal with it anymore.
our family man hasn't contacted anyone to say he is or isn't going to make it in 3 weeks. we'll still save him the spot I guess. up to the DM whether or not he gets auto-leveled to catch up, but I can suspend some disbelief if he wants to.
I talked with the DM about filling a spot with a friend myself and clericbot know from a forum. he said he'd like to meet this person and if he likes, we can have him. victory enough for me. between us, I think we can fill him in since he's completely fresh. I mean, if we can learn it then he can too. known him quite a while.

as for the current quests, the sorcerer's god likes to kill her and give her quests while he's floating. he wants goblin cheese(whatever the **** that is) so after we clear our this dragon have to go get it.
we're after said dragon because it's causing relations between nearby kobold society and the local wolfkin village to clash. I spoke with one of the kobolds and found it's a pressure issue. given that I need to kill one of these for vassal of bahamut...well, we know where this is going. if I receive buffs from the cleric and my friends, does that violate my requirement of "single-handedly killing a juvenile or older red dragon"? there are other enemies(decently powered kobold PC's revealed by an NPC scout and a divination spell) for my friends to fight so it should be fine as long as all of the direct combat involving the dragon is me.

maybe I can use this to raise a goofy kobold army and become Al Borland, Master of Kobolds? move them into my winter stronghold someday and perhaps get quests keeping them content? I'd enjoy that.

just wanted to report in. this is going to be fun.